Still here
Vol. 3, Issue 4
“I look forward to dying. I tend to think of death as a reward for a life well-lived.” --Bob Weir
NEWS & NOTES
Still here
You’re young and single. You live alone. What happens if you die and no one notices?
In China, where there may be up to 200 million one-person households by 2030, a new app has gone viral. It’s called Sileme (translated to Are You Dead?), and the concept is simple. Single people who live alone download the app and check in with it every two days by hitting a large green button with a little ghost on it. This action confirms that they are still alive. If the app isn’t notified in that time frame, the user’s emergency contact is informed.
The app, described by its developers as a personal safety assistant, was recently rebranded outside China as Demumu because some people thought the original name was too morbid. Last week, it ranked among the top five most downloaded in Australia, Hong Kong, India, the Netherlands, Singapore, Spain, the U.K. and the U.S.
Although Are You Dead? is targeted at young singles, its developers said they also hope to market a similar product for the elderly.
FMI: Click here.
A rabbit remembered
Last summer, The End Files featured an obituary for Alex the Great, a floppy-eared Flemish Giant rabbit who was saved from a California slaughterhouse when he was just a wee kit.
In 2021, his adoptive parents, Kei Kato and Josh Row, placed a dark bow tie with orange crabs on the 4-month-old rabbit and took him to a San Francisco Giants game. Not surprisingly, his visit went viral:
But Alex was more than just famous; he became a beloved character in the Bay Area. Alex served as an ambassador for Lions Clubs International. He helped to hand out 400 Easter eggs to children. And while wearing fashionable bow ties and riding in a remote-controlled car, Alex provided comfort at sporting events, farmers’ markets, airports and to people in hospice care.
He died last July at the age of 4.
Now his adoptive parents are honoring Alex by opening a new cafe in San Francisco that will also serve as a rescue and adoption center. Bunny Cafe San Francisco will, of course, offer drinks and snacks, but patrons may also pay a fee to visit the bunny lounge and meet with 10 to 12 adoptable rabbits.
The owners are working with area shelters to ensure that the cafe experience is both safe and low-stress for the animals. A portion of the proceeds from the lounge will also be donated to local rescues.
FMI: Click here.
Looking back on Dr. Death
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NOTABLE OBITS
* Jirdes Winther Baxter, the last known survivor of the 1925 diphtheria outbreak in Nome, Alaska, died. She was 101. Baxter was just 11 months old when she was hospitalized with diphtheria, a highly contagious and dangerous bacterial disease. Her mother and brother were also hospitalized with the illness. Since Nome was about 1,000 miles from Anchorage, where the antitoxin was located, a plan was devised to transport the medicine by train for 300 miles and then by sled dogs for the final 674 miles. This heroic effort became known as the 1925 Serum Run and the Great Race of Mercy. (Jeré Longman, The New York Times)
* Barbara Aronstein Black, 92, the first woman to lead an Ivy League law school, died. Black earned a law degree and a teaching fellowship at Columbia University, then left academia in 1956 to raise a family and care for her ailing mother. It would be nearly two decades before she completed her Ph.d. in history at Yale and re-entered the workforce as an assistant professor in 1976. Black joined the Columbia Law faculty as a professor of legal history in 1984 and was offered the deanship less than two years later. As dean, she added more women and people of color to the faculty, instituted a maternal leave policy and reformed the curriculum. (Natalie Schachar, The New York Times)
* Fashion icon Valentino Garavani, who dressed Hollywood starlets, models and royalty, died. He was 93. Garavani studied fashion in Milan and at the École de la Chambre Syndicale de la Couture Parisienne in France. With his father's financial backing, he opened Valentino in Rome in 1960. For the next 48 years, the charismatic fashion designer would serve as its creative director, starting trends and defining Italian style. Valentino dressed actresses Cate Blanchett, Anne Hathaway, Audrey Hepburn, Sarah Jessica Parker, Julia Roberts and Elizabeth Taylor, as well as former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy and Princess Diana. He also had a particular penchant for the color red, which he once told the Los Angeles Times was his “lucky color.” (Ethan Beck, The Washington Post)
* Glenn Hall, 94, who was considered to be one of the greatest hockey goalies of all time, died. The Saskatchewan native joined the Chicago Blackhawks in 1957-58 and would ultimately play 618 of his 906 career games with the team. During his tenure there, Hall set an unbreakable record of 502 consecutive starts — all without wearing a mask. Known as “Mr. Goalie,” Hall mastered and popularized the butterfly stance and became a seven-time, first-team NHL All-Star. He was also a member of the Hockey Hall of Fame and selected as one of the NHL’s 100 Greatest Players. (Ben Pope, The Chicago Sun-Times)
* Hollywood manager Barbara Lawrence died at 82. The native New Yorker moved to Los Angeles in the early 1970s and began working at the Abrams-Rubaloff Agency. Over the next three decades, she would work at other talent agencies and build up a stable list of talent. Among her many famous clients: Chris Evans, Traylor Howard, Rue McClanahan and Alan Rachins. (Mike Barnes, The Hollywood Reporter)
* Forensic artist Harvey Pratt died at 84. A self-taught Native American artist, Pratt wanted to become a commercial illustrator, but was told by an art teacher that he lacked talent. So, Pratt joined the Marine Corps and, after serving in Vietnam, became a police officer in Midwest City, Okla. In 1972, the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation hired him, and over the next 45 years, he would create facial reconstructions and sketches of homicide victims and suspects. Pratt also designed the National Native American Veterans Memorial, which was built on the grounds of the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C. (Trip Gabriel, The New York Times)
* Swiss author Erich von Däniken, 90, who wrote bestselling books claiming that aliens came to earth and gave ancient civilizations the advanced technology needed to build the pyramids, died. Von Däniken spent his early years hopping from job to job, working as a waiter, a barkeep and a hotel manager. He was also repeatedly accused of financial improprieties for which he spent several stints in prison. His first book, “Chariot of the Gods?” earned him a fortune, and he used that money to travel the world in search of new mysteries. These stories became fodder for future manuscripts. His books would eventually earn him the very first “Ig Nobel” prize for literature. (The Associated Press)
* Mathematician Dr. Gladys West, whose work laid the foundation for modern GPS technology, died at 95. Born into poverty and raised in the South during the Jim Crow era, West refused to let anyone use her gender or the color of her skin to hold her back. She earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in mathematics from Virginia State College (now Virginia State University) and began working as a mathematician at the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Dahlgren, Va., in the 1950s. Her calculations and programming helped to create precise geodetic models that enabled satellite-based navigation. That work was then used to build the Global Positioning System (GPS), which reshaped modern navigation. (Mary Wadland, Zebra)
FAMOUS DEATHS IN HISTORY
On January 26, British ceramicist and founder of the Royal Horticultural Society John Wedgwood (77), Native American writer/educator/musician/political activist Zitkála-Šá (61) and Italian-American gangster Charles “Lucky” Luciano (65)
On January 27, novelist J.D. Salinger (91), folk singer Pete Seeger (94) and actress Cloris Leachman (94)
On January 28, Nobel Prize-winning Irish poet/playwright W.B. Yeats (73), comic book writer/co-creator of Superman Jerry Siegel (81) and actress Cicely Tyson (96)
On January 29, journalist/satirist/cultural critic H.L. Mencken (75), Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Robert Frost (88) and Australian author Colleen McCullough (77)
On January 30, Betsy Ross, the seamstress widely credited with making the first American flag (84), Seminole Indian chief Osceola (34) and the first known American tattoo artist/circus performer Maud Wagner (83)
On January 31, Polish-American film producer/movie magnate Samuel Goldwyn (91), Olympic gold medal swimmer Eleanor Holm (90) and suspense novelist Mary Higgins Clark (92)
On February 1, English novelist Mary Shelley (53), Dutch painter Piet Mondrian (71) and actor/comedian Buster Keaton (70)
On February 2, German boxer Max Schmeling (99), mystery writer Dorothy Gilman (88) and actor Philip Seymour Hoffman (46)
RECOMMENDED SUBSTACK
FAMOUS LAST WORDS
“My boy, the quenelles de sole were splendid, but the peas were poor. You should shake the pan gently, all the time, like this.” --French chef Marie-Antoine Carême to a pupil
MOMENT OF GRATITUDE
Thanks to Warren Umoh, Unsplash, NBC News, Apple News, The Associated Press, Time, BBC News, KPIX CBS News Bay Area, YouTube, Bunny Cafe San Francisco, ABC 7 News, The New York Times, The Death Deck, The Written Word, Good Morning America, The Washington Post, the Chicago Sun-Times, The Hollywood Reporter, The Oklahoman, the Los Angeles Times, Zebra, Phil Lewis, A Bit of Good News, On This Day, Playback.FM, Britannica: This Day in History, Time and Date, Wikipedia, Mourning Mom Time Travels, Canva and Deposit Photos for art and story suggestions. Note: Generative AI was not used during the ideation, creation or publication of this newsletter.
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